Problem Installing Cheetah on iBook G4

macrumors newbie

Hey guys, i didnt have much to do a couple days ago so i thought i'd install Cheetah on my iBook G4, turned out to be harder than i thought. For some reason it doesnt boot any os prior to Tiger, so I installed Tiger and copied an image of the Tiger OS with the OS 9.2 (i think you have to have it on the system to install prior OS's).

So i did that and when i pop the Cheetah cd in it loads and opens OS 9.2 but then it says: "This Application Does Not Run In The Classic Environment - To Install Mac OS X, start up your computer from the Mac OS X CD." Which i did but still doesnt load....

I still have an old PowerBook G3 and installed Cheetah on it, then i removed its hd, and created a new sparse image from it. Then i booted up Tiger on the ibook g4 and restored from the image, all went fine, i selected the correct boot device and even repaired permissions but still it doesnt want to boot up Cheetah on the iBook!

Moderator emeritus

The iBook G4 didn't even exist during the time period that Cheetah was on sale -- it came out in 2003. So the Cheetah box didn't say you could install Cheetah on iBook G4's. The box said you could install it on G4 Macs -- because there were PowerMac G4's available at that time.

thread startermacrumors newbie

The iBook G4 didn't even exist during the time period that Cheetah was on sale -- it came out in 2003. So the Cheetah box didn't say you could install Cheetah on iBook G4's. The box said you could install it on G4 Macs -- because there were PowerMac G4's available at that time.

Click to expand...

The box does say you install on ibooks but i doesnt say g3 or g4, it simply says "ibook computer", but i think you might be right on that one...

yes i tried holding down the C key and also tried holding down the option key, but the installation cd wouldnt load...

I also noted that the box says you can install it on a powerbook g4, but i tried installing on my powerbook g4, but again it wouldnt boot from the cd, mine is a 1.5Ghz with 1.25GB Ram, could it be that it only work for earlier models???

Moderator emeritus

The box does say you install on ibooks but i doesnt say g3 or g4, it simply says "ibook computer", but i think you might be right on that one...

yes i tried holding down the C key and also tried holding down the option key, but the installation cd wouldnt load...

I also noted that the box says you can install it on a powerbook g4, but i tried installing on my powerbook g4, but again it wouldnt boot from the cd, mine is a 1.5Ghz with 1.25GB Ram, could it be that it only work for earlier models???

Click to expand...

For the iBook, the reason for the naming confusion is that there never was an "iBook G3" technically. All the G3 iBooks, both color/clamshell and white plastic design, were simply called "iBook," sometimes with designations like SE for special edition or something, but otherwise just "iBook." That was merely the naming convention they used at the time.

For the powerbook: yeah, once again, whether you like it or not, Apple's standing design policy is that no computer they make will install any version of the operating system earlier than the version with which it initially shipped. So if your computer didn't ship with 10.0 or an earlier system on it, it will not install 10.0.

Bottom line: the only way you can install and run 10.0 as the native operating system on a Mac is if you get one that either shipped with 10.0 or shipped with the old MacOS -- e.g. a 9.x computer -- that meets the 10.0 system requirements. Anything that shipped with 10.1 or later won't run it.

If you want to know what to shop for, if this is really important to you, go to a site like http://www.apple-history.com -- you're looking for computers from 2001 and before.

thread startermacrumors newbie

For the iBook, the reason for the naming confusion is that there never was an "iBook G3" technically. All the G3 iBooks, both color/clamshell and white plastic design, were simply called "iBook," sometimes with designations like SE for special edition or something, but otherwise just "iBook." That was merely the naming convention they used at the time.

For the powerbook: yeah, once again, whether you like it or not, Apple's standing design policy is that no computer they make will install any version of the operating system earlier than the version with which it initially shipped. So if your computer didn't ship with 10.0 or an earlier system on it, it will not install 10.0.

Bottom line: the only way you can install and run 10.0 as the native operating system on a Mac is if you get one that either shipped with 10.0 or shipped with the old MacOS -- e.g. a 9.x computer -- that meets the 10.0 system requirements. Anything that shipped with 10.1 or later won't run it.

If you want to know what to shop for, if this is really important to you, go to a site like http://www.apple-history.com -- you're looking for computers from 2001 and before.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the explanation, it really helped, im gonna check on that website

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